Advances in semiconductor processing and logic design have permitted an increase in the amount of logic that may be present on integrated circuit devices. As a result, computer system configurations have evolved from a single or multiple integrated circuits in a system to multiple hardware threads, multiple cores, multiple devices, and/or complete systems on individual integrated circuits. Additionally, as the density of integrated circuits has grown, the power requirements for computing systems (from embedded systems to servers) have also escalated. Furthermore, software inefficiencies, and its requirements of hardware, have also caused an increase in computing device energy consumption. In fact, some studies indicate that computing devices consume a sizeable percentage of the entire electricity supply for a country, such as the United States of America. As a result, there is a vital need for energy efficiency and conservation associated with integrated circuits. These needs will increase as servers, desktop computers, notebooks, Ultrabooks™, tablets, mobile phones, processors, embedded systems, etc. become even more prevalent (from inclusion in the typical computer, automobiles, and televisions to biotechnology).
To conserve power, various power management schemes are utilized both within a processor of a system and other system components such as system memory and so forth. One technique to save on power consumption is to place a processor into a so-called package low power state in which all cores of the processor are in a lower power state in which the cores are not actively performing work. Oftentimes when in this package low power state, one or more cores of the processor will need to be awoken in order to handle a processing task such as a memory access request received from a peripheral device or other entity. When exiting this low power state, typically the processor remains in a higher power active state for a longer time than needed, namely for a fixed interval of time. This can lead to reduced power saving opportunities.